Despite being worshiped on Fox morning, afternoon and night, Crybaby-in-Chief Donald Trump is very upset that there are occasions when – gasp, the network does not act like an arm of the White House.
The Daily Beast spoke to “three people who have independently spoken to Trump about Fox News over the past four weeks" and was told that Trump has “repeatedly” asked, “What the hell is going on at Fox?” According to The Daily Beast, Trump “sounded surprised and frustrated that he was seeing too many people to his liking on the network treating him ‘unfairly’ on their shows.”
Beyond his rage-tweeting, the president has in recent months reminded his senior aides, including his top economic adviser (and former CNBC star) Larry Kudlow, to branch out and make sure to keep doing more and more shows that aren’t on Fox News, according to two people with knowledge of Trump’s request.
The president has also told multiple associates that he sees Fox mogul Rupert Murdoch’s sons as “very liberal” and has quizzed former and current Fox personalities about what they think of them and if the Murdoch kids can be trusted. (Rupert Murdoch also doubles as a prominent informal adviser to Trump, often taking calls from the 45th president.)
But don’t expect the network to stamp out the rare moments when it goes out of the Trump tank. As The Daily Beast also noted, Trump’s attacks on Fox also provide the network with a pretense of independence.
(Trump caricature by DonkeyHotey via Creative Commons license)
Now we’re hearing Trump’s narcissism is so sick he’s spending many hours of executive time reading press clippings about himself put together by his White House staff. On one international trip a witness saw him spending something like 8 hours going through box after box of articles on himself. Meanwhile, Trump has no interest or attention span to read bills, intelligence reports, etc. It’s so bad his staff has to insert a lot of pictures into reports to keep his attention.
I don’t say this as a smear or make this claim lightly. Trump is clearly mentally ill and needs professional medical intervention.
My instincts say that Fox News will likely stay as it is until their audience of primarily older viewers starts to dissipate.
